The Green Swamp, spread across parts of Lake, Polk, Sumter and Pasco counties, is where four Florida rivers begin. The Withlacoochee, Hillsborough and Peace rivers rise in it, along with the headwaters of the Ocklawaha, and water leaves it in almost every direction. It covers about 560,000 acres of cypress domes, pine flatwoods, marshes and low sandy ridges, and it rarely looks like much from the road, which is part of why it has survived. Its real importance is underground. The Green Swamp sits on one of the high points of the Floridan Aquifer in Central Florida, where the aquifer's pressure is greater than in the land around it. Rain that soaks in here recharges the aquifer that supplies drinking water to much of the region and feeds springs miles away. The swamp acts like the top of a water tower for the middle of the state. Because of that role, Florida designated the Green Swamp an Area of Critical State Concern in 1974, one of the first places in the state to get that status, which limits how densely it can be developed. The pressure has not gone away. The swamp lies between Orlando and Tampa, and subdivisions along Interstate 4 and U.S. 27 have crept up to its edges. Much of the core is now protected public land, including the Green Swamp Wilderness Preserve.
Getting there
28.3545, -81.9581
Locations are approximate and may be inaccurate, on private land, or otherwise inaccessible. Check before you travel.
Hear it from the road
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